This invention relates to novel compounds, viz 2-, 3- and 4-trifluoromethylbenzoyl bromides, and a method of preparing the same and to a method of converting 2-, 3- or 4-trifluoromethylbenzoyl bomide to 2-, 3- or 4-bromobenzotrifluoride.
Bromobenzotrifluoride is of use as an intermediate material for some medicines and agricultural chemicals.
A known method for preparation of bromobenzotrifluoride is bromination of benzotrifluoride (J. Chem. Soc., P.T. 1 (1984), 893). However, the product of this method is always a mixture of three isomers, 2-, 3- and 4bromobenzotrifluorides. Another method is trifluoromethylation of bromobenzene (J. Fluorine Chem., Vol. 18 (1981), 281), but the product of this method is a mixture of 2- and 4-bromobenzotrifluorides. Still another method is fluorinating bromobenzoic acid with SF.sub.4 (Chem. Abstr., Vol. 83 (1975), 9118r). By this method a desired product such as, for example, 2-bromobenzorifluoride from 2-bromobenzoic acid is obtained without forming unwanted isomers. However, this method is unsuitable for industrial application because of very high toxicity of SF.sub.4.